Top scorer Harvey Smith dedicated his goal to his grandparents after Whitstable’s historic FA Vase victory on Sunday.

Having trailed at half-time to AFC Whyteleafe player Dan Bennett’s strike, forward Smith equalised through his 17th goal of the season before Ronald Sithole got the winning extra-time goal as it finished 2-1 to the Oystermen at Wembley.

Smith kissed his wrists and pointed skywards in his goal celebration.

“I did it twice,” he revealed.

“On my left wrist, I’ve got a tattoo of when my Nan passed. Then on my right wrist I’m going to get a tattoo of when my Granddad passed so, doing the left wrist and right wrist, that was for them.

“I had to dedicate my goal to them.”

Smith was supported at the national stadium by cousin Ryan Flack, with roles having been reversed six years ago when forward Flack had been a part of the Cray Valley team that suffered a 3-1 extra-time defeat to Chertsey Town.

“He was messaging me Saturday night, asking how we’d settled in and how our tour was,” said Smith. “I think he was buzzing more than I was - and that’s very hard!

“But I saw him in the stands and he was telling me he was proud. I think he did say, if I won, I would be the better player.

“So, I’ve got that one on him.”

Smith struck from Nathan Jeche’s lay-off to find the bottom corner in the early stages of the second period to level the game up in his man-of-the-match display.

He recalled: “Jeche got the ball on the side and cut it back to me. Then, I’m always going to shoot!

“I didn’t have many chances in the first half so, as soon as it came to me, I was just thinking ‘Shoot.’.

“It wasn’t the best finish, but it ended up in the back of the net, so I can’t really complain.”

That came after Jamie Coyle’s men had endured a tough first 45 minutes, in which they had gone behind and lost midfielder Connor Wilkins to injury.

But Smith said: “I don’t think we were bad at all.

“There were just a couple of little things that we needed to correct. Going in at 1-0, when we were in the changing room, everyone had the feeling we were all sort of still together. We knew what we were correcting.

“We went back out there and I think you saw in the second half that the game sort of flipped.”

Whitstable’s record for the season run-in now finishes at one loss in 90 minutes in their past 28 games, having finally got their hands on the silverware they deserved after a Kent Senior Trophy final defeat and Southern Counties East League Premier Division play-off semi-final shootout heartache.

“It’s unreal,” said Smith. “It still hasn’t really sunk in. Even walking out on the pitch the day before, we were thinking ‘How are we even playing here?!’.

“I’m never going to forget this day. I’ll probably even get a tattoo of the date somewhere, as well, because I might as well.

“But to actually play here in front of 9,000 fans I think it was from Whitstable, that was unreal.

“They were amazing.”